Very interesting article about using environments to define behavior. While the stand out example is of reducing errors in medication being handed out through nurses where a vest that means they cannot be interrupted; there was another example directly relevant to software where the method of a silent cockpit in commercial airlines was adopted:

The IT group decided to try an experiment--they established 'quiet hours' on Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday mornings before noon. The goal was to give coders a sterile cockpit, allowing them to tackle more complex bits of coding without being derailed by periodic interruptions. Even the socially insensitive responded well to the change in the Path. ... And the division VP attributed the success to the sterile cockpit quiet hours: "I do not think we could've made the deadline without it".

Software engineers use the ipod for that purpose, endeavouring to shut out the world and get to focus on the task at hand. The alternate is pair programming where you enjoy distraction with another developer as you work on a solution but where the chatter and interruptions are about the work you are doing.

Our company has moved over to Agile where it is being adopted at all levels of the organization. One of the issues that hasn't been resolved is the cube farm where the engineers work. I have not thought up a solution to that yet. We are sticking our scrum boards up in the cube farm area now, where they were isolated in a conference room down the hall previously, but as to what to do with the cubes - I don't know. Apparently we can do what we want with the area but I haven't been able to think of anything, and neither has anyone else so far it seems.